


A Missed Lunch Date (or: Reasons to Burn Down Heaven)

by Raichel



Series: Not Quite So Safe [1]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Established Relationship, However if you are looking for injury based drama read on!, I don't think it's enough to count as "graphic" but violence did happen, I think it's kind of angsty but others beg to differ, M/M, Post-Apocalypse, aka post-canon, it's mostly just kinda melodramatic, so fair warning if you aren't looking for blood in your fanfic, there IS some post-torture stuff though, there's a definite undercurrent of gay so I guess it's also
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-17
Updated: 2019-06-20
Packaged: 2020-05-13 18:27:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,225
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19256734
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Raichel/pseuds/Raichel
Summary: They had agreed to meet for lunch. They often did, after the end-times-that-weren’t. Aziraphale checked his watch again for what was at least the fifth time; Crowley was late. And this was not fashionably late, as the demon often was. This was over half an hour, did-you-completely-forget, or did-you-sleep-through-your-alarm late.Where could the demon be?





	1. Late

They had agreed to meet for lunch. They often did, after the end-times-that-weren’t. Aziraphale checked his watch again for what was at least the fifth time; Crowley was late. And this was not fashionably late, as the demon often was. This was over half an hour, did-you-completely-forget, or did-you-sleep-through-your-alarm late.

First, Aziraphale tried to call him on his little flip phone. (Crowley had made him get it in the early 2000s because he was sick of not being able to call him. “Get with the times!” he had demanded for at least the 100th time in as many years.) When he got Crowley’s answering machine he left a polite message:

“Hello! It’s me. Just checking in about lunch. Call me back!”

Ten minutes later he tried again. Still no luck. 

Five minutes after that he tried again. Then again, five minutes later, and again. And again. And again. 

It had gotten too late now, an hour after they’d agreed (and he’d checked repeatedly that he hadn’t missed daylight savings again), and with eight missed calls it was getting out of hand. This had exceeded you-just-forgot late, and become I-need-to-track-you-down late.

Aziraphale left the restaurant and hailed a cab. It was likely nothing, surely. Crowley had likely just forgotten, or gotten caught up in some adventure, or lost his phone. He wouldn’t have been so worried before the non-pocalypse, he would have just assumed Crowley didn’t show up, but now they were really, truly friends. They weren’t trying to play nice with their bosses, and now, after all, they essentially only had each other. So he had to check, no matter how many rational explanations he could come up with for Crowley’s absence. It was just unusual enough. Better safe than sorry, but likely everything was just fine and this was all an overreaction. It would all be perfectly alright.

It became a little harder to believe that when he found the Bentley still parked outside Crowley’s apartment building. But perhaps Crowley really had just lost track of time, sleeping in.

He miracled (small miracles, an unlocked door, a distracted security officer) his way into the apartment, and found it dead silent.

“Crowley?” he asked, taking a hesitant step in the room.

No answer.

“Hello?” he tried again. The only response he got what the shuddering of leaves. Crowley’s plants were lovely, but also very high strung. “It’s alright,” he told them, walking past, “Is he here?” he asked, but of course, plants can’t answer. 

The only substantial trace of Crowley was his abandoned phone, which Aziraphale found lying on the ground, with eight missed calls.

That was the farthest thing from reassuring Aziraphale had seen all day, and at that moment the panic set in in earnest. Crowley was very much missing. He’d abandoned both his phone and his Bentley, neither of which was to be expected, and Aziraphale realized, standing in the middle of one of Crowley’s barely-decorated rooms, he had no idea where the demon was.

For a human, of course, to lose track of someone is quite reasonable. Your mate goes out for a run, leaves his phone, you might not know where he is for an hour or two. But for Aziraphale, having genuinely no suspicion where Crowley was, especially when outright looking for the demon, was deeply unsettling. He would be the first to admit he didn’t consider it often, but for millennia, now, whenever he’d gone looking for Crowley he’d had some sense of where to start. Otherwise how could you find someone that you hadn’t seen in roughly a decade, and who could just as easily be in the next town over as across the globe? It was how he’d found him after being discorporated around the not-pocalypse. To not have any sense of Crowley being anywhere, it felt like when the power goes out and you realize just how loud all of your appliances sound. It felt wrong.

Aziraphale couldn’t help but consider the worst. But there was still the second-worst: if Crowley wasn’t on earth, he could only be in two other places. 


	2. Hell

The most likely place Crowley might have ended up was Hell. They’d suspected that their former bosses might call them back someday, but they tried not to think about it. Now Aziraphale had to. 

He’d only been to Hell once, and, admittedly, had sauntered vaguely downward to get there, but he’d been masquerading as Crowley then. To walk into Hell as an angel was… dicey. A questionable decision. But if that’s where Crowley had been taken, it wasn’t of his own free will, and it was unlikely anyone would be likely to let him go again without some persuading. So, Aziraphale figured he’d have to convince them himself.

As soon as he set foot in Hell all eyes were on him. How could they not be? He stuck out like a sore thumb among the dark, dinginess of Hell. 

“Hello,” he said, “is there perhaps a Crowley here?”

The demons exchanged skeptical looks. A couple stepped toward him, starting to draw weapons.

“Oh, I wouldn’t do that,” he noted, pulling a small bottle out of his coat, "I understand a little bit of this goes a long way on you.”

The demons, to a one, recoiled from the holy water. He had not come unprepared. After the universal step back, a taller demon stepped forward (though still keeping a few feet away from Aziraphale),

“You think we’d have Crowley?”

“Hastur, isn’t it?” Aziraphale asked, “And yes, I’d assume so, he is a demon after all.”

“With any luck he’ll never be here again,” Hastur grumbled.

“So you don’t have him?” Aziraphale prompted.

“Absolutely not.”

“If you’re lying to me,” Aziraphale told him, holding up the holy water, “this will not be the worst you’ll get.”

“I ain’t lying,” Hastur insisted, “I never want to see that demon again, and I don’t—“ he flinched away from the holy water, “want to get on the wrong end of that.”

“Alright then,” Azirapahle concluded, putting the bottle away and leaving the way he had come.

 

That left one other option, but it didn’t make much sense. Why would Crowley be in Heaven? Again, he absolutely would not be there by choice, but what would Heaven possibly want with him? Still, Aziraphale couldn’t face the alternative; there was nowhere else Crowley could be that Aziraphale wouldn’t at least have some suspicion of where he was. Unless he was just… nowhere, but if he was anywhere, Aziraphale had to find him.


	3. Heaven

Aziraphale, if he was quite honest, was more afraid of Heaven than of Hell. He had faced demons before, he’d even seen Satan himself. He really wasn’t very afraid of any enemies anymore, but former allies were a whole other issue. If Heaven still had hellfire on call, and caught him? That was it. 

But he still made his way up to Heaven, stepping cautiously. The perpetual open floor plans of Heaven were a double edged sword so far as sneaking around was concerned: he could be far enough away from anyone at any time so as no one would notice him at all, but get too close and the only hiding places were essentially pillars, which offered only so much protection (especially for someone as soft as Aziraphale). It helped that he’d spent so much time on earth; many angels had never even met him, and wouldn’t blink an eye at him walking around across the room. But there were just enough archangels still around that he needed to stay alert. 

He was so focused on the angels around him and not getting caught that it took him ten minutes or more to realize he had an idea of where to go. It wasn’t certain, or even particularly clear, but he had some idea of where Crowley might be. He tried very hard not to get over-excited; it had been a long day already, and his mind could be playing tricks on him, but this was the first time today he’d had any idea where he might find the demon, and he would be damned if he didn’t follow that instinct. (At any rate, he had debatably been damned already after stopping the apocalypse.) 

He walked down halls, through offices, up and down stairwells, trying to maintain an air of casual purpose. Everyone in Heaven had an air of casual purpose: somewhere to be, but you were a little early to the meeting, so no need to rush. it was hard to keep up when his stomach was turning over and over wondering what he would find at his destination. He started peeking through doors when no one was looking, and when his eye finally caught a dark splash among the infinite lightness of Heaven, he froze. 

Crowley was here, in this unassuming back room of heaven, strung up by his wrists. His jacket was entirely missing, as were his glasses, and he was absolutely covered in scrapes, tears, and bruises. His wings, one snapped in just the wrong place, hung tattered and half-folded at his sides. The larger part of one of his hands was a sickly purple, and there was a particular slice that stretched across most of one leg. Blood was dripping down his face; it was hard to tell if his head was bleeding, his nose, or his mouth, or all three, the thin river of red tracing from his forehead to his chin.

He was absolutely limp, and for a moment Aziraphale feared it might just be his body, left behind. But no, as the door shut behind him Crowley jerked to life, wings fluttering aimlessly. He struggled to back away from the door a step or two, supporting his weight as much on his chains as his legs. That was when Aziraphale saw his eyes: milky, glazed over, darting around the room unseeing. One seemed to have a scar across it. They’d blinded him, on top of everything else.

On the one hand Aziraphale wanted to rush to him, grab Crowley and never let him out of his sight again. On the other he was too horrified to move.

“Back, are you?” the demon snapped, gaze settling right around Aziraphale’s forehead. “What is it this time?” he spat out a mouthful of blood.

“Crowley—“ Aziraphale took a step closer, starting to reach out.

“Oh, that’s a dirty trick,” Crowley snarled. “I won’t beg, dammit, not even to him.”

“What?” Aziraphale flinched back, mind reeling with what the angels might have done to Crowley, “It’s really me, don’t worry—“

The sound Crowley made could be best described as a laugh, but it was a harsh, bitter, spat-out laugh.

“You really think I’m that stupid?” Crowley said, “Stay away from me, filthy angel.” he tried to back further away. Aziraphale tried not to take that personally. 

“I promise, it’s me—“

“Prove it,” for the smallest fraction of a second, Crowley faltered in his anger. He wanted to believe his ears, but he couldn’t. “Prove it,” he demanded again, sharper, “tell me something only Aziraphale would know.”

“Well, um— hang on,“ Aziraphale realized his stupidity and snapped his fingers; Crowley’s bonds broke open, as they should have as soon as Aziraphale walked in the room. The demon crumpled to the ground for a moment before scrambling back to his feet and backing against the wall. His legs shook, and his wings curled around him so far as they could, the closest thing he could manage to a shield. 

Aziraphale stayed right where he was. As much as he wanted to hold Crowley, protect him from whatever had happened, he knew better than to further corner a wounded animal, let alone a wounded demon. 

“F-for starters, you've been preforming miracles for hundreds of years,”Aziraphale muttered by way of proof, keeping his voice low, “and I’ve been doing your temptations. But I also know you’re very committed to your plants, you much prefer drink to food, you really enjoyed 70s fashion, you don’t appreciate getting rained on, you snore like a bloody chainsaw—“

“Oh god, Aziraphale,” Crowley stumbled forward and Aziraphale caught him, though the weight pulled them both to the ground. Crowley held tight to him, running one hand through his hair, and searching for the edges of his bowtie, just to make sure.The demon was trembling, barely able to hold himself together. 

“What did they do to you?” Aziraphale asked, not quite expecting an answer.

“Nothing good,” Crowley assured him, face buried in the angel’s chest. “I don’t know what they want,” he muttered, “whether I’m supposed to be bait for you, or if they’re doing Hell’s dirty work for them.”

“Why haven’t you discorporated?”

“Can’t,” was the short answer, “I can’t go back down there. It’s taking all I’ve got to stay.” Crowley shuddered, and Aziraphale held him tighter.

Aziraphale had not often felt compelled toward vengeance. The closest he’d come was resentment over a few stolen books, bitterness over the closing of some particularly good restaurants, and general devastation over the loss of the library of Alexandria. Still, in retrospect, nothing had elicited a drive for vengeance, exactly. Nothing had elicited that particular hatred and anger. Until now. 

Now, he was beginning to fully understand murder in a way he never had before. He couldn’t see many problems with making a few very specific angels suffer, and maybe roughing up Heaven a bit for good measure. But he only had so much power, and the choice was absolutely between exacting vengeance and healing Crowley. So, though whoever had done this could burn in hellfire, and the rest of Heaven could shove it anyway, he was still an angel. Healing took priority over vengeance.

“Hold on,” he told Crowley.

“What do you think I’m doing?” Crowley muttered back, and Aziraphale miracled them out of the awful stark whiteness of Heaven.


	4. Home

Back in the relative safety of his bookshop, Aziraphale laid Crowley out on the bed he kept around for appearances and the odd nap every few years. The demon winced and groaned, but eventually settled, exhausted, still shaking occasionally. 

“We’re in—“

“—the bookshop,” Crowley finished for him, “I know.”

“How?” Aziraphale asked out of pure curiosity. Crowley hadn’t opened his eyes since Heaven (not that it would matter). Aziraphale puttered around, trying to figure out what he should do for Crowley. Bandages? A blanket?

“Well, for starters, I’m just assuming you’d only put me in my bed or yours,” he mumbled, “and your shop smells distinctly different than the apartment.”

“What do you need?” Aziraphale asked, entirely unsure what to do. He ran a hand through the demon’s hair, and Crowley flinched. 

“That hurts, sorry,” he told him, taking the hand out of his hair and holding it in his less-damaged hand instead.

“No, it’s alright,” Aziraphale said.

“I just need sleep,” Crowley added, answering the question.

“Of course,” Aziraphale replied. With a squeeze of Crowley’s hand he gave the demon a little magical help getting to sleep. He didn’t need much, and it would make healing all the easier.

it took a lot of energy, but not much observable work, to undo everything—not even everything, just all the worst things—those angels had done to Crowley. A few gestures here and there, the occasional touch, and the demon was much, much better off. Even the horrible gash on his leg was mostly healed, though there’d be a bit of a scar, and his eyes would be good as new. 

Barely any energy left, Aziraphale slumped down, leaning against the bed, and took Crowley’s hand in his before passing out entirely.


	5. Crowley

Crowley jolted awake at the sound of the store’s bell. He sat up and blinked, eyes darting around the room; he could _see_. And he didn’t feel like death, either, though he was still sore all over. All things considered, that was pretty good. He glanced down at his hand, tangled in Aziraphale’s, but,

“Aziraphale?” Gabriel’s voice barked from the main store floor. 

“Shit,” Crowley muttered, looking down at the absolutely racked out angel, leaning precariously against the bed. And his poor coat, splattered with blood. _His_ blood, Crowley realized.

“Aziraphale?” Gabriel asked again, a few steps closer. It would still be a while before he made his way back here, sure, but that was not a point Crowley wanted to get to. He looked between his angel and the voice, and back again. He squeezed Aziraphale’s hand and dragged up a fair amount of power for a demonic miracle. He stood up, folding his wings away, and straightening Aziraphale’s coat, swiping the blood stains away. He stepped out to greet Gabriel, wearing Aziraphale’s body, leaving his own body behind with Aziraphale.

“Yes?” he greeted Gabriel and his companions: that bitch Micheal and the dumpy one. Whatever his name was. Didn’t matter. It was much harder to fake Aziraphale’s smile after the day he’d had. Especially looking at Micheal; he knew she’d done the blinding, breaking his glasses into his eyes, and he suspected she’d done more. Nonetheless, he thought he was faking it quite well. “How can I help you? I thought we agreed we wouldn’t be seeing much of each other?” he added, unable to keep a hint of venom out of his voice.

“Our data suggests you’ve performed a lot of miracles today,” Gabriel explained, “and we just can’t be having that—“

“Especially if they’re being used on demons,” Micheal added.

“Which we have some reasons to suspect they are,” Gabriel concluded.

“You seem to be forgetting the last time we saw each other,” Crowley reiterated, sure any positivity he’d been able to fake behind the eyes was now replaced with pure malice. The smile was still plastered in place, though. “Perhaps you’re forgetting I’m an angel immune to hellfire,” he said, taking a step closer to Gabriel.

“You think I’m afraid of you?” the big man scoffed, but it was stiff, at least a touch forced. Years of dealing in politics, Crowley could tell when big men were bluffing. 

“Oh! Are you not?” Crowley asked, in Aziraphale’s most pleasant voice, “Would you like a taste of the fire, then?” he asked, snapping his fingers and summoning just a lick of hellfire. The angels all took a step back.

“Just, stop using so many miracles,” Gabriel concluded, starting to back out of the store. 

“Don’t tell me what to do,” Crowley told him with the same smile, striding forward to get them out quicker.

As soon as they were out the doors he locked them tight. He’d surround the whole place with hellfire if he had to, just so long as neither of them had to face any angels for a good, long while.

Crowley returned to the bedroom and took Aziraphale’s hand again, returning the body to its rightful owner.

“Was someone here?” the angel muttered, turning to face him, only barely opening his eyes.

“No one important,” Crowley replied, “come get in bed,” he added, gently tugging Aziraphale’s hand. The angel blearily crawled up into the bed, and Crowley laid down beside him. 

“Remind me to burn Heaven to the ground later,” Aziraphale muttered, curling up to Crowley.

“Alright. I’ll try, Angel,” Crowley told him. “Thank you,” he added, placing a kiss on Aziraphale’s forehead.

“Anytime, dear,” Aziraphale yawned, before falling back asleep.


End file.
